9 men murdered in Indy in last 7 days

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INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. -- A series of deadly shootings in Indianapolis left three people dead in less than 24 hours.

Nine men have been murdered in the city within the last week.

It all started last week on the north side, along East 44th Street. Three people were shot. Wesley Small and Dajuan Mitchell were killed. Hours later, Anthony Jones died after being shot on West 18th Street.

A day later, in broad daylight on the west side, Devon Grice was killed on Sharon Avenue.

Over the weekend on High School Road, 46-year-old high school baseball and wrestling official Ryan Goss was gunned down. On Monday, Senteayehou Henry was killed inside his own home on Chester Avenue.

Tuesday brought three more deaths; Simon Wills was killed on Lasalle Street, Cullen Hubbard on West 29th Street and Deontea Davis on East 25th Street.

“It’s extremely alarming and it’s disheartening,” said Aaron Williams with Peace on the Streets.

This week, Williams organized a virtual town hall meeting. The number one message he heard is the need for more community engagement.

“The community has to step up,” said Williams. “That means when you see criminal activity in your neighborhood, instead of turning a blind eye, you need to notify law enforcement.”

The case of Simon Wills is a good example. Henry Wills said his son had been the victim of a recent non-fatal shooting in June. Police say Wills did cooperate with police and even named his suspected shooter.

Unfortunately, that's not often the case and most non-fatal shootings go unsolved because witnesses or victims fail to cooperate, only to later see the violence turn deadly.

“When you withhold that info for various reasons, there tends to be an escalation and that’s where you we see fatal homicides,” said Williams.

So far only one suspect, Jamarr Edmond, has been arrested for one of the nine murders in the past week.

Williams says distrust of law enforcement has led to a code of silence for many witnesses.

“Many people feel if they turn information in there’s going to be retaliation and they frankly don’t feel safe doing that,” said Williams. “We can do better, but it takes everyone working together.”

This week’s violence brings the total number of Indianapolis criminal homicides in 2016 to 86. That’s compared to 70 at the same time last year.

Anyone with information on any of the murders in the last week is asked to contact Crime Stoppers at (317) 262-TIPS.